This invention relates in general to planing machines and in particular to a new useful machine for the underground mining of coal.
The invention relates to a planing machine for the mining of minerals, in particular to a coal plane for underground mining with a planing chain guided on the filling side, and comprising at least two individual planes with plane bodies joined to each other via an articulated connection and with a sword plate of each plane body gripping under a conveyor chute.
In such planing machines, the sword plates are usually interconnected by hinges with hinge pins extending perpendicular to the planing direction. This is to obtain the necessary adaptability to the floor when traversing troughs or saddles. But the articulated connections necessitates a relatively long link plate and, consequently, a relatively long lever arm which is to serve for the absorption of the considerable transverse forces occurring when the planing machine is working, namely when the planing knives of the planes engage the face to be mined. The occurring transverse forces are even increased yet by the fact that they are guided by gliding friction along the conveyor chute sidewall on the face side. All this requires the use of relatively big sword plates whose adaptability to the floor, even considering the hinge connections, is often unsatisfactory. This applies in particular to the inability to traverse curves.